Following a crisis, questions are often raised about how this crisis could have happened and whether someone is to be blamed for the crisis or its bad management. The blame game can become fierce as actors try to avoid, shift or mitigate blame in order to stay in office. In 2014, a festival took place in Haaksbergen where a monster truck drove into the audience, killing three people and injuring many others. Not enough safety measures had been taken to prevent the tragedy. Many actors were to blame for that, including the local authority which had granted the permit. Other actors blamed for the events were the mayor, the monster truck driver, and the organization organizing the festival. In the end, the mayor of Haaksbergen resigned. Instead of becoming more accommodative in his response as his blame levels increased, the mayor continued to be quite defensive, stating that the permit would be granted again – even with today’s knowledge. As one council member stated it, one cannot defend something which cannot be defended.

The concept of positive security appears more and more often in academic and public discussions. It presents a normative agenda for a non-repressive approach of security. In the article, it is claimed that the concept and its implications lack fundamental clarity. First of all, it is illustrated that the meaning of positive security primarily develops on the renouncement of negative security. Second, a historical comparison between the discipline of international relations and criminology discloses that different meanings have been assigned to positive security that seem at times at odds with each other. These frictions substantiate the view that it is problematic to accept positive security as an unequivocal recipe for change. Finally, the consequences of the disseminated structure of meaning are discussed in relation to the ambition of reform that positive security represents. For example, advocates of positive security do not seem eager to commit themselves to very clear normative views. This makes it difficult to really pin down what the suggested changes underlying positive security, are truly implying. Moreover, positive security invites us to extend the horizon of security politics to include various kinds of positive needs and values. But doesn’t this take us back to the initial criticism that the reach of the security concept has extended too much, covering virtually every aspect of life?

This article discusses the complex relations between the organizational fields of safety (i.e. disaster and crisis response) and security (i.e. crime prevention and public order), and the ways in which disciplinary and organizational boundaries make it difficult to come to a better integration or coordination in the safety and security domain. Based on results of a research project on cooperation and information-sharing between organizations in the fields of safety and security, the authors argue that it is not realistic to refer to safety and security as relatively independent fields. Instead, it would be more useful to approach it as a connected domain, encompassing both safety and security disciplines. Yet, the separation of the two fields is strongly embedded in the culture and responsibilities of organizations in these fields, which reinforces the disciplinary boundaries in the domain. Nevertheless, in the last few years it seems that there is an increasing recognition of the need for multidisciplinary collaboration in the safety and security domain. This paper explores possible directions for creating more coherence and integration in the safety and security domain. The authors believe that much progress can be made if key stakeholders in the safety and security domain are able to adopt a broader, multidisciplinary perspective when approaching safety and security events.

A number of authors claim that the Dutch government is using the words safety and security more often and more broadly. In this article we show that this is partly true. By studying the usage of the word safety in the Dutch queen’s speeches, we see that especially from 1999 onwards the speeches do contain more references to safety and security issues. Moreover, more and more topics are defined as a safety and security issue. However, this same study shows that a decline in the use of the words safety and security can be discerned from 2006 onwards. Ideas to understand these fluctuations are presented at the end of the article.